The present invention generally relates to methods and systems associated with financial transactions. More specifically, the present invention relates to methods and systems for account management of group accounts.
People's tendency to form groups for various purposes is an inherent characteristic of human civilizations. For example, a group of people may be formed for a social or business purpose. Examples include a book club, in case of a social purpose, and a company or a project team, in case of a business purpose. People also form groups for other socioeconomic and/or practical purposes. A group of roommates sharing an apartment may serve such socioeconomic and/or practical purposes.
Many of these groups may need to conduct financial transactions, including collecting, spending, and tracking their financial resources and/or transactions. For example, groups may collect money in form of membership dues, contributions, charitable donations, and/or payments for work performed. Furthermore, groups may spend money in order to acquire various products and services as part of their normal operations. In one example, business project teams may need to buy office supplies and pay for travel expenses, and financial transactions may need to be audited by a financial controller. In another example, book clubs may need to pay expenses related to meetings, refreshments, and website maintenances, and authorization of financial transactions only by a particular member may be desired. Yet in another example, roommates may share joint financial responsibilities for paying rents, utility bills, and groceries, and authorization of a transaction by all roommates or only by a particular roommate may be desired. Furthermore, the roommates may want to review some or all financial transactions related to the joint financial responsibilities.
In addition to collecting or spending money on behalf of a group, group members and others who have monetary transactions associated with the group also need to track at least some portions of the monetary transactions incurred by the group in order to review, monitor, and ensure that money is spent according to their ethical, legal, and/or personal expectations related to the group.
Although conventional methods of managing financial activities of a group exist (e.g. a joint bank account), the conventional methods do not provide a fine level of control or granularity for group members to customize and personalize their options for group-associated payments, collections, or tracking of group account-related financial activities.
Therefore, effective and convenient systems and methods for each group member to authorize monetary collection or spending for a group account may be highly desirable. Furthermore, novel systems and methods which allow each group member to customize, track, and authorize financial items related to a relevant group account may also be desirable.